ANEM WEEKLY MEDIA UPDATE 

DECEMBER 15 - DECEMBER 21, 2001

• JOURNALIST REITERATES ASSAULT COMPLAINT AGAINST CACAK MAYOR

BELGRADE, December 15, 2001 A Belgrade journalist who claimed last night to have been assaulted by the mayor of Cacak today said he as made formal complaints over the incident.

Nedeljni telegraf journalist Dragan Novakovic claimed last night that Velimir Ilic, who is the leader of DOS member party New Serbia, and mayor of the central Serbian city of Cacak, had invited him to the Intercontinental Hotel and then assaulted him.

Ilic immediately denied the assault last night, claiming that he had told Novakovic to leave after he burst into a room at the Intercontinental demanding an interview.

Novakovic said today he was attempting to obtain cellphone call records which would prove that Ilic had called him twenty minutes before he arrived at the hotel.

He was also seeking tapes from CCTV cameras in the hotel lobby.

The journalist also that charges would be laid against Ilic.

“This is not about Velja Ilic or Dragan Novakovic, but about somebody daring to physically attack a journalist. This cannot be allowed, even if that somebody is the mayor of Cacak,” Novakovic told B92.

• ANEM DEMANDS INVESTIGATION INTO ILIC-NOVAKOVIC INCIDENT

BELGRADE, December 15 2001 The Association of Independent Media has demanded the authorised state bodies conduct a vigorous investigation into the alleged assault by Cacak mayor Velimir Ilic on Nedeljni Telegraf journalist Dragan Novakovic.

"ANEM addresses primarily the Interior Ministry, requesting it investigate the case and inform the public in detail,” said the statement."

Novakovic claims Ilic assaulted him during a meeting in a hotel in Belgrade.

• THIRTEEN POLICE FROM NIS SUE BLIC

BELGRADE, December 15, 2001 Thirteen police officers from the south Serbian city of Nis have filed criminal libel charges against Veselin Simonovic, the editor-in-chief of Belgrade daily Blic.

The charges refer to a list of 362 Serbian policemen deployed in Kosovo during NATO’s 199 bomb attacks and allegedly of interest to the Hague Tribunal.

Blic republished the list after it was originally published by weekly Reporter. The magazine’s editor has consistently claimed it is authentic.

Simonovic today told Radio B92 that the police had been manipulated by the Interior Ministry into taking legal action against him.

• RTS REFUSES TO PAY VOLLEYBALL RIGHTS

BELGRADE, December 17, 2001 Radio Television Serbia has broken its contract with the Federation Internationale de Volleyball, by which the state broadcaster should pay the organisers of the World League for broadcasting rights.

Hence, despite a successful tournament, the Yugoslav volleyball team did not get their royalties. The FIVB had overlooked the non-payment last year, transferring the debt to the next competition. It refused to do the same this year.

RTS director Aleksandar Crkvenjakov argued the broadcaster was being asked “to pay the old debt incurred” under the former management.

“This is a huge amount of money now and we don't have it,” said Crkvenjakov, insisting he would “never have signed such such a contract.”

The director demanded the state be consulted since RTS itself has no “commercial interest” in such a contract.

• NUNS OPENS FIRST REGIONAL OFFICE

KRAGUJEVAC, December 17, 2001 The Independent Association of Serbian Journalists (NUNS) has opened its first regional office in Kragujevac.

Senior member Filip Mladenovic and project coordinator Branko Vuckovic spoke at the opening.

"In future, the Association will pay much more attention to the union fight, and seek improvement in the economic and social position of journalists,” said Mladenovic."

“Only the economically and socially independent journalist can truly be a free journalist,” he added.

• CODE OF ETHICS FOR JOURNALISTS IN MONTENEGRO

PODGORICA, December 17, 2001 The Montenegrin Media Institute has announced the Yugoslav republic is to adopt a code of journalistic ethics, following a meeting of Montenegrin journalists and media representatives.

A statement insisted it was necessary to begin work on "self-regulation within the profession" and the adoption of basic professional principles and standards which would apply to all Montenegrin journalists.

The Montenegrin Media Institute has been charged with drafting the document.

• JOURNALISTS MUST HIGHLIGHT JUDICIAL ERRORS, SAYS PROFESSOR

BELGRADE, December 17, 2001 Prof. Frauke Ebermann, one of the most respected experts on court reporting, has held a series of lectures as part of the court reporting course for young journalists, organised by the non-governmental Forum for Media Initiative and German Heinrich Bell Foundation.

Ebermann told Belgrade daily Danas that the most important thing is for a court reporter to be interested in “human fate.”

“He must not be close to either side in the process. He should not feel sorry for the defendant, he should not be intimidated by the judge,” said the professor.

According to Ebermann, a court reporter must illustrate how the court works and to criticise judges when they make mistakes.

• JOURNALIST COMMITTEE WARNS ILIC

BELGRADE, December 18, 2001 The Committee for the Protection of Journalists yesterday questioned Cacak journalist Svetlana Zaric and Nedeljni telegraf reporter Dragan Novakovic, after they accused Cacak mayor Velimir Ilic of harrassment.

The committee, formed in association with the Independent Association of Serbian Journalists, ruled that Zaric's journalistic rights had been compromised.

Zaric presented a recording of Ilic's comments before the Cacak Municipal Assembly, in which she claimed to have been threatened and "harshly insulted.”

Regarding Novakoviæ's accusations of assault, the Committee said it would demand to talk to Ilic or obtain a written statement on the incident, on which a final stance would be taken.

The Committee warned state officials, in particular Ilic, that they cannot threaten journalists or abuse their power and the institutions they represent.

• HAGUE TRIBUNAL SHOULD BE SUBJECT TO CRITICISM

BELGRADE, December 18, 2001 People must be aware of what The Hague does and through impartial reporting, they should be confronted with the crimes that have been committed, the press representative of the Tribunal’s Belgrade told a recent forum.

Mathiass Helmann told a forum on relations between the media and the Hague Tribunal, organised by the Helsinki Human Rights Committee, that it would not be a bad idea if the Tribunal itself faced public criticism.

Helmann insisted public opinion is instrumental in terms of cooperation between the former Yugoslav republics and the tribunal.

He explained how much of the public in Serbia feel the court was established solely to try Serbs, while in Croatia they know only of the trials of Croats.

• SOCIALIST DAILY BITES THE DUST

BELGRADE, December 19, 2001 Belgrade daily Jutarnje novine has ceased publishing after its printer refused to print further issues because of unpaid debts, Danas writes today.

Jutarnje novine, which had debts of about 100,000 dinars last appeared last Thursday.

The paper was founded after Belgrade's October revolution last year and was close to the Socialist Party of Serbia.

The daily's premises were deserted yesterday.

• DRAGAN NOVAKOVIC ON INTERNCONTINENTAL INCIDENT

BELGRADE, December 19, 2001 Today's issue of Nedeljni telegraf published a detailed article by Dragan Novakovic on Cacak Mayor Velimir Ilic and the “physical assaults and alarming threats” suffered by the journalist in the Intercontinental Hotel last Thursday.

Novakovic reiterated that he had responded to an invitation from Ilic, in order to respect the rule of fair play and allow Ilic to present his story. He added that he had spoken to Ilic by telephone on Wednesday when the issue went on sale. “I asked him if he had read the story. He said he had not and that the story was not so important because only six per cent of the population of Serbia were literate, but that it was important because TV Pink had carried the story,” said Novakovic.

Novakovic said that after the incident with Ilic he had informed Police Minister Dusan Mihajlovic, General Sreten Lukic, General Bosko Buha and Deputy Serbian Prime Minister Zarko Korac.

Korac, he said, had been shocked and had scheduled a meeting with the next morning at which he told him to calm down and not worry “because Velja’s like that”.

Novakovic claimed that he was then contacted by a Mrs Pavlovic from Ilic’s New Serbia party who tried to straighten things out.

“I was almost ready to accept a compromise, with an apology from Ilic or New Serbia, even for a ‘unfortunate misunderstanding’, but then my colleagues from another daily called to tell me that Ilic had told them that he would ‘break all my teeth, smash my head in and skin my back’. I repeated this to Mrs Pavlovic who was caught off guard and asked me to have patience, to wait until she called her boss and said she would call me back.,” said Novakovic, adding that he had subsequently received no further calls about the incident.

• NGO CRITICISES POLITICANS’ BEHAVIOUR

BELGRADE, Wednesday The Humanitarian Law Centre has called on the leaders of political parties and representatives of the authorities to display tolerance and respect for differences and to refrain from threats, insults, scorn and inciting ethnic and racial hatred. The Centre noted that recent speeches of leaders and MPs of the Serbian Radical party, some other parties in the Serbian Parliament and Cacak Mayor Velimir Ilic included racist views and ethnic prejudices.

The Centre, in its press release, said it was particularly concerned by the behaviour of Velimir Ilic because the public knew him as a politician who had contributed a great deal to the change of authorities in Serbia.

The public appearances of Velimir Ilic show his violent behaviour towards journalists who reported on his business dealings or political activities.

Velimir Ilic displayed open threats in his denial of having physically assaulted Nedeljni telegraf journalist Dragan Novakovic over his article “Velja Ilic’s Cypriot partners part of Europe’s biggest tobacco mafia”, said the Centre in its statement.

“If I had wanted to beat him he wouldn’t have had a single tooth left in his mouth. That sorry bastard deserves to have his back skinned. God forbid I meet him somewhere: I’ll beat him sill, him and his boss Beba Popovic,” Ilic said, according to the statement from the Humanitarian Law Centre.

A journalist from Duga magazine, Zelimir Markovic, was telephoned on September 11 by a person who introduced himself as Velja Ilic and who with oaths and insults threatened to kill and destroy him if he continued to write about the problems of the Milan Blagojevic company from Lucani.

At a press conference in Cacak on August 6, Velimir Ilic described Vecernje novosti Milena Markovic as a “sub-deb and a Belgrade drug addict. He also referred to the papers editor-in-chief, Manojlo Vukotic as “the shame of Serbian journalism, whose price is a hundred Deutschmarks in cash and a bottle of beer”.

To accusations that he was responsible for smashing windows on the offices of Radio Ozone in Cacak, Velimir Ilic replied “We’re not small time Gypsies. When we smash things up the grass doesn’t grow there any more”.

Ilic frequently mentions Romanies and Albanians in an insulting context. Speaking about possible early elections in Serbia, he remarked “Better that than to act like Gypsies”.

His dissatisfaction with investment problems with building a highway through Sumadija was expressed on August 28 with the words: “I don’t know why it’s a fairy tale when we want to build something in the heart of Serbia but it’s reality when we make a road for Albanians or Bulgarians”.

“Velimir Ilic is a person who has political power and his words in public have a special weight, particularly when one has in mind that the hatred of any difference in this environment often easily slips into violence,” noted the Humanitarian Law Centre.

• HUMAN RIGHTS COURT DISMISSES NATO BOMBING

STRASBOURG, December 20, 2001 The European Court of Human Rights has refused to hear a case against 17 NATO-member states for the bombing of Serbian state television during the 1999 attacks on Yugoslavia.

Judges in Strasbourg unanimously declared the case inadmissible since Yugoslavia is not a member of the Council of Europe.

In a statement, the court said Yugoslavia “clearly did not fall within this legal space,” adding the European Convention on Human Rights “was not designed to be applied throughout the world, even in respect of the conduct of contracting states.”

The complaint was lodged by six Yugoslavs, five of whom were relatives of the some of the 16 state television workers killed when NATO bombs struck the Radio Television Serbia premises in central Belgrade on April 23, 1999.

Their lawyers said the bombing violated articles of the European Convention on Human Rights guaranteeing right to life, freedom of expression and the right of an effective remedy for complaints.

• JOURNALISTS BACK BLIC BOSS

BELGRADE, December 20, 2001 The Independent Association of Serbian Journalists has expressed support for Blic editor Veselin Simonovic over libel charges filed against him by thirteen Nis police officers.

In a statement, the Association described the charges, laid with the encouragement of the interior ministry, as reminiscent of the familiar scenario of orchestrated pressure on the media.

source: ANEM
published by: Roland Brunner rbr@medienhilfe.ch date of release on this site (DD/MM/YY): 13-01-2002

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